Catching up with Game Character Academy

By Emma Handley

Back in January 2013, we caught up with online school, Game Character Academy to learn more about how the school was founded and what they had planned for the future (read here). Fast forward a few months and we're ready to see what they've got lined up for their current and potential students!

Hi guys, thanks for chatting to us again! Now that our readers know all about Game Character Academy from our previous interview, we want to delve a little deeper into what they can expect from studying with you guys. First up, what's the latest workshop?

Thanks for having us back!

Since the last time we spoke, we've made some significant changes to Game Character Academy. We initially offered two 18 month courses, one for Character Art and another for Character Rigging/Technical Art.

We have since decided to turn the Character Rigging/Technical Art course into a series of modularized 8-12 week workshops as well as introduce a whole series of new workshops that cover things such as lighting, traditional sculpting and facial rigging. This allows people to sign up for a one-off workshop and learn a specific area of production from an industry professional through the lectures and individualized feedback. There is no long term commitment and it's at a more affordable price.

"The Character Art course at GCA is the only curriculum I have seen that provides the focused attention to the skills and foundation required to become a great 3D character artist"- Toby O'Hara

We've still kept our full Character Art 18 month course, because for that particular area and skill, we feel that career development is critical and there is more of a demand for that long term education. We're very excited about this change as it allows us to service and educate a much broader audience. It also gives us much more expandability as a school.

What can students expect to learn from these workshops?

We've started off with a selective list of workshops and every three months we'll be introducing new ones.

Right now we offer Introduction To Python Scripting for Maya, Introduction To Rigging, Maquette Making: From Clay to Digital Sculpting, Digital Lighting and Introduction to Facial Rigging.

Each one of these workshops will range from 8-12 weeks in length, include over 12-15 hours' worth of online lectures, a weekly feedback video from your instructor and a weekly live session with your instructor where you get to ask questions about anything and everything.

We're also constantly checking in with our students to find out what other workshops they'd be interested in, so they also get an opportunity to drive the direction and availability of new content.

"Trained by 'Industry professionals' is a term used vaguely in the VFX education arena these days, but at GCA you are truly being taught by leads from AAA studios such as Blizzard and Naughty Dog to name a few"" Jon Shelley